COMMENTARY: Cures Act provides critical funding

Monday

Jan 2, 2017 at 10:00 AM

By Deborah Cornwall

Congressional passage of the 21st Century Cures Act and its Dec. 13 signing by the President represents a long-awaited healthcare milestone.

The bill authorizes billions of dollars to fund the Cancer Moonshot (intended to double the rate of cancer research progress), the National Institutes of Health Precision Medicine initiative (treatments tailored to individuals' unique genetics), and the BRAIN initiative (to advance understanding of brain and central nervous system disorders). Significant money is also authorized for state opioid abuse prevention and treatment initiatives, and insurers will be required to cover mental illness as they cover other diseases. Finally, the bill provides for expedited Food & Drug Administration review to ensure fast but safe approval of proposed new drugs and medical devices.

The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN), advocacy affiliate of the American Cancer Society, worked tirelessly to support the passage of this bill through hundreds of personal visits with lawmakers in Washington in September and through a variety of personal contacts offering information and asking them to vote for the bill. In one day this month, CAN advocates and their families and friends nationwide generated millions of social media contacts (Facebook and Twitter) to individual lawmakers to press for its passage. Some of those came from our community, and they mattered.

Such aggressive "lobbying" initiatives are essential to help educate legislators about the needs of cancer patients and their caregivers. The statistics are that one in two men and one in three women will contract cancer in their lifetimes. The federal government is the largest funder of cancer research in the country. Our lives are literally in their hands.

To learn more about ACS CAN and to find ways to work with a local advocacy team, go to www.acscan.org or contact melissa.cushman@cancer.org. By joining us to speak out, you could help save your own life.